Hi! I'm Dave from Boyinaband :D Today I want to address that say that internet friends aren't "real friends" (o_o) This is something particularly often from my friend's parents :D or their more extroverted friends. :/ Even though the internet has been around for AGES now, there's still this stigma associated with people you meet online. :| (here we go) You know, you'll be conversating on the topic of your best buds, and you happen to mention an internet friend, they'll be all like: "Yeah, but I mean like, REAL friends." Or you're having a healthy meal and you have an irrelevant anecdote about your mate you met online and they say "Ugh, you're acting like they're your real friend!" "You don't know them!" So to bring those people out of their neanderthalic stupor I'll explain why they're incorrect with a quick thought experiment involving my stupid gross cat. Ok! So we've got two- Seriously, you're offended by me calling it names? IT DOESN'T CARE IT'S NOT CAPABLE OF UNDERSTANDING HUMAN SPEECH AND ALSO IT DRIBBLES WHEN IT'S HAPPY AND THAT'S AS GROSS AS IT IS ADORABLE... but, l-look it genuinely has no effect on it emotionally. You're stupid. You're pointless. You are mind-numbingly insignificant. Look, look. You're an idiot. You're purposeless. (don't you mean purr-poseless-- okay back to subtitles) Cat: i'm outta here No one cares about you. D:< Cat: bye See? It has genuinely no emotional effect.¯\_(ツ)_/¯ As I was saying, we've got two dudes and two cats. One cat is near Dude 1, and the other lives in South Korea! *under breath* The lucky frickin fastest-internet-in-the-world-having piece of- Dude #1 explains to Dude #2 a silly thing that the cat to their left did. In response, Dude #2 jovially laughs, exclaiming, "What a wonderful silly thing!" "Your bond of mutual affection allows me to enjoy this anecdote! :D" Then dude #1 explains a silly thing that- The South Korean cat did on Skype. Dude #2 is immediately flung into a whirlwind of rage exclaiming: "OH MY GOD! How could you possibly have a legitimate have a connection to them?!- You've not even met and anyone who says it's a worthwhile relationship is- A queer f*g HOMOGAPIENS!!" The reason that dude #2 is getting so frustrated is because he's confusing this: With this: Actually, dunno if everyone will get that reference. Ok, with this! Oooh edgy. There are many arguments that the Dude #2s of the world might throw at this topic- So to resist those people with this mindset let's expunge some of the most common ones. Argument #1: "But you haven't even met them!" Are you implying that because you can't touch them you can't enjoy their company? Let's see how that logic plays out shall we? "Yea yea. Oh I'm just hanging out with my friend!" "You're not my friend we haven't touched yet. . ." *Long awkward pause* *pokes* ". . .Ok, NOW I'm hanging out with my friend." "No, it's gotta be on the skin!" "What?" "That's the rule!" "Bu-" "THAT'S THE RULE!" *Audibly cringes* That's not the rule. If you spend time developing a mutual affection for someone, that is what a friendship IS. It has nothing to do with physical contact, You still interact with that person, whether it's in real life or through a cable, that- isn't as fast as the South Korean frickin' internet, little high bandwidth pieces of- Argument #2: "They might be a serial killer rapist paedophile!" The likelihood of them intending to disembowel you while you sleep, Isn't an issue of whether you interact with them online, It's an issue of whether you've spent sufficient time together to warrant trusting them. So to the people who pull the "Don't meet them in real life they might rape and murder you" card, If you video chatted to prove you are both who you say you are And have spent a considerable amount of time getting to know each other, Short of hacking into their NSA profile, there's no reasonable way to prepare for a real life interaction better. HELL, that's more preparation than you have meeting people in real life in a traditional situation. :O Argument #3: "They're probably lying about themselves." Then you'll be happy to be informed that a study of internet deception discovered that people are actually more likely to lie in real life, than online. And that makes sense! When you say something in real life, the words just disappear after you say them. Whereas, online, something you've typed is there FOREVER. As Sam Pepper, CeeLo Green and Justin Bieber are all well aware. :') But to those people who still think that internet friends have faked their profiles, used someone else's pictures and deceive their victims for years, Firstly, Video chatting will clear a lot of that up, Secondly, Con artists exist in real life too, And thirdly, What percentage of people do you think have the time and inclination to do something like that? It doesn't make sense to let that infinitesimally small probability of something scary happening diverge you from the much more likely outcome of someone having found a friend. Argument #4: "But humans are social creatures." Yes, and some humans are able to satisfy a large portion of their social desires through interacting online! It doesn't necessarily mean someone doesn't want to hang out with friends in real life, more likely it's just more convenient to do so on the Internet. because they don't have the money for regular flights to South Korea, to take advantage of their FREAKIN' FAST INTERNET GOD DAMN- Argument #5: "They're just not as GOOD as real friends." Okay, with real life friends you've got maybe several thousand people you can come into contact with in the local area, less if you're stuck in school or work with the same people constantly. With internet friends, you've got 2.92 BILLION you can choose from. So being generous with about 10,000 people you can feasibly meet in real life, that makes it 292,000 times more likely you'll find a really well-matched friend, online. And pushing that number higher, Also, the internet allows you to filter people down to incredibly specific interests. Like if you enjoy watching long haired guys emphatically explaining things on the Internet You'll likely to find similar-minded friends in my subscriber base. The closest real life equivalent is standing near the crazy religious guy in the park hoping someone will join you. :\ Where'd you claim that two people forced to make friends out of necessity because they were flung into the same school, club, or workplace are gonna be better suited than two people who meet on a cat lovers' forum on a post admonishing some English guy who insulted his STUPID, GROSS, DRIBBLING cat? No! Friends you make on the Internet are MATHEMATICALLY more likely to be better. Because there are MORE to choose from, and its much easier to find like-minded people. And when THOSE arguments finish, you'll frequently hear something like: "They're not a true friend. Unless you could INTERACT with the person, it doesn't feel as real." Which is another way of saying: "I have no logic to back up my statement, but I'm gonna keep saying it anyway." Their subjective interpretation of what constitutes 'a friend', doesn't change the reality for those people who meet on the Internet. They FEEL like they're friends and that is the ONLY prerequisite, a sense of mutual affection! And the Internet can make friendships that would NEVER be possible in real life, that allow people from entirely different countries and cultures to share their life experience. I've had conversations with people from the other side of the freakin' WORLD that felt closer and more eye-opening than anything in real life because of the nature of the medium. and it makes me so SAD that some people will NEVER get to experience that because of their preconceptions. To deny that Internet friends are real is like saying: "Only the people in your immediate vicinity are worth caring about." If two people are happy spending time together, Whether that's in the same room or with an internet connection and a freakin' OCEAN between them, then there is no logic in claiming, "that's not a legitimate friendship." But that's just what I think, let me know what you think in the comments below. From both sides of the fence! I'd love to read your opinions. :D And if YOU have a friend, internet or not, that has to deal with people denouncing the legitimacy of their friendships, hopefully this will HELP those people understand why they're incorrect. LIKE if this video resonates with you, and SUBSCRIBE for more Boyinaband videos. :D Cheers for watching and have a nice day! :D
I like that guy, especially his hairs.
Sarcasm: Yup, online friends aren't real friends. People online aren't real people after all. It's not real life, you stop being alive when you are online. And people on the phone stop being real too. And when you close your eyes I vanish from the universe.
Unless you mean facebook friends, then yes, they don't give a fuck about you. It's a "like" competition and they're in it to win.